A Terrible Beauty: What Teachers Know but Seldom Tell outside the Staff Room

by Dave St. John

  The stars shone vividly over the little town spread out under an impossible weight of stars. It was a wonder they weren’t crushed by such a massive emptiness.

  That was it—after twenty years, he was no longer a teacher. In spite of everything, he hadn’t really believed they would take his job.

  He really was one stupid son of a bitch.

  O’Connel looked back over his shoulder at the school squatting on the hill. They wouldn’t be out for a while yet.

  He had time.

  A wealth, a fortune of time—all he would ever need.

  He had forever.

  It turned bitterly cold.

  Freezing mist settled over the river, leaving a scum of ice on everything it touched. To see, he melted a spot on the boat windshield with the palm of his hand. The porch light was his only guide home. He could barely make it out, now. Smiling into the icy dark, he guided the boat across. He could still see the look on her face. It had been worth it to see her like that, to see her taken off guard. If it had been his last card, all the more reason to play it with élan.

  Sonny waited on the dock, trembling, eager for his hand. Worn yellow teeth shone ghostlike in the darkness. The dock was slick with ice, and as he climbed out of the boat he nearly fell. Feeling more alone than he had in a long time, he headed up the walk, frozen gravel solid as stone under his feet. The house was silent, the stove cold, his heart clay. He lit a fire, showered, made tea. Opening a forty-year-old copy of Wuthering Heights, he settled back on the wide soft couch before the fire. The dismal story suited his mood tonight, but before long he closed the book, disgusted with a simpering Heathcliff. A yellowed page he folded dog-eared to mark his place and it cracked like filo.

  Why read further? It would only end in a gradual slide into despair—love poisoned by loneliness, by self-loathing. Some stories were better not carried through to conclusion. Better they ended before they became tiring. Tossing the book away, he lay back, hand reaching over cold leather to the snub-nosed revolver he’d brought down from his room. Heavy, cold, comforting, he wanted it near him tonight. For a long while he sat, checkered grip tight in his grasp, eyes unfocused on the glass of the stove. He never should have brought her. Now he couldn’t sit here without smelling her, seeing her, feeling her. There was nowhere clean of her, nowhere he could forget. Even here, she existed. Slipping the .357 down between the cushions of the couch, he drew a blanket over him, set his glasses on the table, switched off the light, lay back. He would rest a bit, just a bit. Then, then he would decide.

  • • •

  Someone called his name.

  Disoriented, he came awake.

  Again came the voice. Low as chafing silk, dark as the river, “Dai.” Skin tingling, he stood, transfixed by the vision before him in the shadowed room.

  The moon hung a gibbous crescent over the river, illuminating the room in chiaroscuro. Neck prickling with a dreamer’s dread, he rubbed gravel-filled eyes, desperate to clear his sight. By the door, back lit by moonlight from the window, hovered the form of a woman.

  “Why?” she said.

  Sick with relief— he sat up, pressing his face with both hands. For the first time in a long time, he breathed. “How’d you get here?” He reached for the lamp.

  “No, don’t, leave it dark.” The moon reflected off her hair as she moved closer. “Why?” she said again.

  She was right, it was easier in the dark. “You know why.”

  She hesitated. “They let you go.”

  “I know.” Letting her coat slide to the slate, she slid down beside him on the old haystack of a couch. In the moonlight, in the guttering flames of the fire, he could see her face. Like a moth under the paw of a kitten he was held fast by the flame reflected in her eyes.

  “How did you get here?”

  “Frank brought me across. I offered to pay him, but he wouldn’t take any money, said it was about time.” She laughed. “After midnight and he came to the door with a cigar stub in his mouth. Does he sleep with it?”

  “He might.” For a moment neither spoke. Then, in an agonizingly slow pirouette, she turned her back, hair sending a current through him as it brushed his arm. Turning her head, her eyes caught his over her shoulder as she lay back over his lap. She took his hands in her cold ones, and overheated from sleep, he savored the coolness of her.

  “You feel so good,” she said, “I thought I’d freeze out there.” He could only look at her, struck dumb by the ache in his throat.

  It was impossible—her being here. He was afraid to touch her, afraid to move. Convinced of what the end would be, still he didn’t dare hasten it.

  He opened his mouth to speak and she covered it with a hand.

  He took her wrist, drawing it away. “I can’t believe you’re here, I just can’t.”

  She smiled up at him. “I am, I am here.” She reached up to trace the curve of his face with her fingers, and he flinched as her fingers teased his upper lip. “I thought you’d come to gloat.”

  “I did. Even brought my soapbox.”

  She looked up at him, eyes narrowed. “How’d you know what was on that disk?”

  “I guessed you’d be stubborn enough to resign. I was right, huh?”

  She reached up for him, and their mouths cleaved in frenzied tenderness, in pain, the exquisite pain of loving too much.

  Breath coming shallow and fast, she pulled away, searching his face, voice less than a whisper. “How can you want me after everything? I don’t understand you.”

  He watched her face dim as a scud of cloud passed by and pressed her to him with all his strength, wanting her closer, deeper than his skin. “How could I not?”

  He gathered her hair, twisting it into a rope in his fist, drawing it tight. “I won’t let you go a second time.” She raised her open mouth to his, nipping, grazing. “Don’t…don’t you dare.”

  • • •

  He awoke alone, cold light flooding in at the windows.

  A low fog blanketed the river. Friday, and for the first time in twenty years he had nowhere to go. Needing to move, to do something, he dressed, ate, built a fire. Through the ceiling, he heard the shower pattering in the tub, and to his disgust he found he could think of nothing but her. He’d been so stupid. To have refused her would have cost only pleasure. Had he sent her home, he could have chosen his hell. Now he couldn’t even do that.

  Showered, dressed, mane bound securely, she came to stand demurely beside him, warming her hands over the stove. “I’m ready to go now.” Not trusting himself to look at her, or even to speak, he went to put on his boots. At the dock, she frowned down at the sagging rail.

  “You ought to fix this, you know.” He said he knew.

  In silence they crossed.

  On the far bank, hating himself for his weakness, he followed her up the frozen gravel path to the rental car. It was going to be awkward, God, it was going to be so awkward. Still, he stood there waiting for it, powerless to turn and go back, waiting for a word, for anything telling him the night had meant something to her. Anything to her.

  She turned impatiently. “Look, I’ve got to go.”

  Not sure what to say, he nodded. “I know.”

  She came to slip a hand inside his coat and against his heart. “It’s not you. It’s me—I don’t talk in the morning. Really, that’s all it is. I’ve always been like this.”

  He nodded, not believing, trying his best to smile, fighting off the notion to stroke her hair, still damp from the shower. The night before seemed long ago, now.

  The icy world was frozen rock hard, the river solid to its bed, his stomach bursting with river rock. Strength fled, voice hoarse with anxiety, he said it—the one thing he promised himself he wouldn’t. “Will I see you again?”

  She laughed at him. “Stupid question.”

  Heart leaped against his ribs, making him dizzy, sick with joy. “When?”

  “Tonight if you want.”

  A rapid breath of frigid air taken in
to his lungs and the river surged, alive, behind them. Fish swept ghostlike upstream against the current. The wind moved again through the top of the wolf tree overhanging the dock. The sun and moon moved through their heavens. He pressed her hand to his chest, managed a real smile this time. “I’ll take you out.”

  “Let’s stay home.”

  “I’ll make dinner, then.” Her upper lip curled in a smile. “This gets better all the time.”

  Brushing his cheek with cool, dry lips, she drew her hand out of his jacket, taking his vitals with it. “See you then.”

  • • •

  The next six weeks were much too good to last.

  Week nights they spent at her apartment. Weekends were long, lazy days across the river curled up on the couch reading in front of the rumbling woodstove. She seemed to need him as much as he needed her. But under it all and through his soul ran a dark, cold stream of dread.

  Shopping for dinner after work, he went over it all again. He substituted a couple days a week, but still had no job. Though she said it didn’t mater, he was sure that at some level it did. She made a hundred a year. He grossed two, maybe three hundred a week.

  There was no arguing with the numbers—if life were a restaurant, and she were at a table, he was outside parking cars. If she were human, she had to think about it. It was only a matter of time. She’d tire of it—and him.

  Lugging dinner upstairs to her apartment, he realized he was afraid. How long would it take? Would tonight be the night? Picturing himself without her, he felt a gulf yawn wide beneath him, and stopped, steadying himself on the railing. He’d tried to keep his distance from her, hold her away somehow, and only now did he see how completely he’d failed.

  Though he loved her, he’d never said the words. Again and again, in their most intimate moments, she’d told him, but though he ached to do the same, he wouldn’t. Pain plain in her face, he kept silent, hoping, praying that somehow, not saying it would make it not so.

  So strong tonight was his presentiment of catastrophe, he nearly fled. Slowly, he lifted his hand to knock.

  Solange flung the door wide, snaking arms under his jacket, “I’ve got something to tell you.” He dropped the bags to wrap his arms about her and cellophane burst, sending noodles skittering across polished oak. For a long moment he pressed her hard to him, feeling her body through her thin chenille robe.

  When at last he released her, she smiled up at him, puzzled. His glasses had slipped down the bridge of his nose. She set them back in place with a finger, and cinching her robe about her, kneeled to gather pasta carefully in her hands.

  “Is something wrong? You squeezed me so hard you scared me—not that I’m complaining.”

  He hunkered down to help. “I just realized something coming upstairs, that’s all.”

  Hair hanging about her a shimmering jet veil, she went on working. “Oh, yeah, what’s that?”

  He sat cross-legged on the floor, breaking noodles. “What a fool I am.”

  She laughed. “I could have told you that, now move, you’re on the noodles.”

  He felt as if he were stepping out into space. “And how much I love you.”

  She stopped, reached slowly to sweep hair out of her face. She looked at him, face stricken, hands full of angel hair, and crawling over on bare knees, climbed onto his lap.

  “Oh, God, I didn’t think you did,” she said, mouth against his neck. “I kept saying it, but you never…” Her breath caught. “You never did.”

  He cradled her to him. “I do. I have. I will.”

  Eyes shut, he rocked her long and slow and at last they went inside.

  • • •

  In the kitchen, she sat, content, chin on palm, watching while he sautéed onion for sauce.

  He noticed her smiling. “What?”

  She hid a smile. “Just thinking.”

  “Come on, what?”

  “How my mother told me to trust you.”

  “She did?”

  “That’s what she said.”

  “So, do you?” She shrugged, gathering her hair. “You’re here.”

  He tipped a dollop of olive oil into the water for noodles, dropped in a handful of pasta. “So what did you want to tell me?”

  She smiled, savoring the moment. There he stood at her stove, and she had the best news in the world to tell. She took a deep breath. “I signed a contract today.”

  He scraped softened onions into a large pan and set the skillet back on the fire. “A contract? For what?”

  This was it. “For superintendent. Hugh resigned yesterday, and today they offered it to me.” She smiled, biting her lip. “I made it.”

  He looked as if he were a long way away. “That’s… Uh…” He shrugged. “That’s fantastic, I’m glad for you.”

  She didn’t like what she heard in his voice. “No you’re not. You should see yourself—you look like you just got a letter from the IRS.”

  He dumped ground sirloin and sausage into the pan. It squealed and sputtered on the overheated iron as he chopped it apart with a wooden paddle. Clouds of steam rose to the ceiling, filling the kitchen with the odor of fennel, browning beef.

  Though they’d never talked about it, she knew what he must feel. She wanted to tell him the rest of her news, but needed to hear his reaction first. She clamped her hands together so hard they turned white, dreading what he might say, but needing to hear it. “Well?”

  “Well, what?” Grabbing the hot pan with a bare hand, he slammed it back down on a cool burner with a hissed malediction.

  She was up and had him at the sink in an instant. “Idiot! What were you doing?” She held his hand under cold water as the sizzling pan slowly quieted.

  Finally he said something. “For god’s sake baby, I’m a substitute teacher. A substitute—that’s one step up the evolutionary ladder from filamentous algae.” He pulled his hand away, went to find his jacket. “You can do a hell of a lot better than that.”

  Cold hand of fear at the nape of her neck, she followed him into the living room and leaned against the wall watching him work his burned hand through the sleeve. “So you’re a sub, what’s wrong with that? Something’ll open up next year.”

  “Don’t play dumb. You make more in a day than I do in a week—in two weeks..” He lifted a hand in the direction of the kitchen, frustration on his face. “I mean, this dinner, that was half what I made today—a lousy spaghetti dinner. How the hell can I ever take you out?”

  She didn’t believe what she was hearing. “I don’t care about going out.”

  “Ah…” He waved her words away. “I can’t even buy you anything.”

  He was so funny, he didn’t understand anything. “I have what I need.”

  He gave up the argument, threw down his jacket in frustration, clamped his burned hand under an arm. “Damn, damn, damn!”

  She went to take his hand, and what she saw frightened her. The skin had blistered, the outline of the pan’s handle imprinted in negative on his palm. “Christ, it looks bad, come back in here.” She led him back into the kitchen and held it under the tap. Seeing the relief in his face, she reached up to smooth his hair. He was so brave, so foolish—she wanted to strangle him.

  He pulled away. “Look, I’m…I’m going.”

  Her hand, wavered on the chrome faucet. “Don’t be an ass! Bring your hand back here.”

  He backed away. “No…I’ve got to go.”

  “Why?” He was scaring her now. “Why would you go?”

  Motioning with his burned hand, he looked as if he might cry with frustration. “I told you, it’s a joke! It’s…” He searched for words but found none. “Ah, to hell with it! It’s just too stupid. This isn’t going to work, that’s all!” He went back for his jacket, Solange following hard on his heels down the hall. Grabbing him by his shirt, she slammed him hard against the wall, knocking askew a print of Courbet’s Despair. It swung, scraping on its wire, while they sized each other up, breathing hard in the silent
hallway.

  He looked down at her. “Cut it out, you little tyrant.”

  She was testing him, and she wanted desperately for him to pass. If he were running away out of self pity, she would throw him out the door herself. For no reason she could think of she shoved him back against the wall again, harder this time, rocking the frame against the plaster. “What’s so stupid about it? Why won’t it work?”

  Unresisting, he let himself be jostled, hand held out of the way. When he spoke, it was low. “You know why. Look at me. I’m forty-years-old, no job. I don’t know how to do anything but teach. What am I going to do, sell insurance? I’d starve to death.”

  She tightened her grip on him, eyes on his. She wasn’t letting go.

  “Okay,” he said, “you’re king of the hill. Good for you. Now come on, stop pushing me around, huh? Let me get my jacket and get out of here.”

  She wasn’t sure what she was prodding for, but she was positive she would know it when she heard it. Terrified he would give the wrong answer, she said the first thing that came to her. “You’re jealous.”

  Slowly he began to smile. Then, head tilted back against the wall, he laughed, a farcical braying, a laugh she loved, finally quieting, out of breath, sagging at the knees.

  She held him up. “What?”

  “That’s it, you got me—I’m jealous.”

  “Okay, then, you’re mad.”

  “Mad? Why? All right, you took my job, but you gave it back, too. I had it right here in my hand. And you know, I thought I wanted it.” He shook his head. “Na. Listen, you know what you said a long time ago? You were right. I knew what I was doing, I knew from day one. No, I’m not mad, I’m just smart enough to know we’re not in the same league, that’s all.”

  Everything she had hoped to hear he had said. Even now he was stronger than she, if only he knew it. Mae was right about him—so right. This one wasn’t going anywhere. Solange looked up at him, sweatshirt still wrapped tightly in her small fists. “Would you take a job if you could get it?”

  He frowned down at her. “A job, what kind of a job?”

  She pushed him back against the wall once more in her impatience and Courbet swung on his wire, worrying his hair. “Teaching, what do you think?”